MISSION21_065_LH_.JPG Ron Mallia wants to turn his empty parking lot in the Mission into an apartment building and the Mission Anti-Displacement Coalition has tried to block his plans.
Liz Hafalia/The Chronicle/San Francisco/8/20/07
**Ron Mallia cq �2007, San Francisco Chronicle/ Liz Hafalia
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Ron Mallia wants to build eight apartments and condominiums on an empty parking lot next to his Mission District auto shop and rent some of the apartments to his mechanics.

His project seems like the kind that would be endorsed by the Mission Anti-Displacement Coalition, but the group has fought Mallia, insisting that his project not go forward until the city evaluates how new development on the city's east side will affect industrial land, jobs and housing.

The fight is one of many recent battles being waged by the coalition, a handful of community organizations focused on immigrants' rights, development and social services that was formed a decade ago to resist gentrification during the dot-com boom. Supervisor Chris Daly, a former tenant activist, takes credit for helping found the group, which has a reputation for staging street protests and illegally occupying private property.

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More recently, it has used environmental laws to stall more than 50 market-rate housing projects before narrowly losing a bid this month to block a condominium project on Cesar Chavez Street that will replace a shuttered paint store.

But some longtime Mission residents and business owners question whether the group is going too far, blocking developments that would add middle-income and affordable housing to the neighborhood, in addition to cleaning it up and making it safer.

"They don't want any development at all in the Mission because any development makes the area better. ... They don't want that because they believe that by improving the area, the cost of housing might go up," said Mallia, who has owned gas stations and car repair shops in the Mission for 25 years.

In April, facing pressure from the coalition, the city Planning Commission approved Mallia's project but with the condition that he pay more than $150,000 in fees that will help fund city services.

Although Mallia believed he was getting a raw deal - similar projects have not had to pay such fees, he said - he did not want his project to stall while he paid taxes on the vacant lot.

Mallia's property, at 736 Valencia St., is among 2,200 acres in four South of Market neighborhoods - the Mission, Potrero Hill/Showplace Square, East SoMa and Central Waterfront - that the city is evaluating for possible rezoning. The Planning Department began examining the area in 2002, having seen that the neighborhoods had lost a big chunk of industrial space to live-work lofts and were being eyed by condominium developers.

More than 50 pending projects were halted in April 2006, when the Anti-Displacement Coalition persuaded the Board of Supervisors to force developers to examine how the projects would affect not just the environment but also the supply of industrial land and blue-collar jobs - and whether the projects were consistent with the city's policies encouraging more affordable housing.

"Through its land-use policies, San Francisco has been pushing for a richer city that does not cater to the people that are already here," coalition coordinator Nick Pagoulatos said.

The city is promoting biotech, green tech and the digital economy at the expense of industries such as printing, furniture repair, warehousing and shipping, he said.

Legal experts say the supervisors entered what appeared to be uncharted territory by adding employment and housing analysis to environmental review requirements.

"That argument is hard to make ... you have to have some factual basis for showing that jobs and affordable housing relate to an adverse environmental effect," said Tim Cremin, a land-use attorney at the Meyers Nave firm in Oakland.

Sean Elsbernd, a supervisor who voted against that expanded environmental review, was among the six supervisors to reject the coalition's appeal of the condo project on Cesar Chavez Street.

Elsbernd said that the coalition's interpretation of the environmental review was "one hell of a stretch," and that the argument could shut down all market-rate housing development in San Francisco.

"It's a slippery slope - with an environmental review you can look at the impact on traffic, pollution, density," Elsbernd said. "But with housing and jobs, how do you quantify in any meaningful way what the impact is on the environment?"

Sue Hestor, an attorney who represents the coalition, countered that jobs and housing do impact the environment and that environmental studies are intended to assess whether the city is meeting its affordable housing goals.

"If you don't have low-income housing in San Francisco, people who are the workforce in this city will have to commute from places like Tracy," Hestor said. "What happens if 100,000 people have to commute from Tracy to work in the city, isn't that an environmental impact?"